


When Life Gives You Lemons

by TheseusInTheMaze



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Baking, Banter, Clothed Sex, Cunnilingus, F/F, Food as Metaphor for Love, Kissing, Masturbation, learning to cook, strong feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-13 18:41:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29033349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheseusInTheMaze/pseuds/TheseusInTheMaze
Summary: Clara feels like baking. The TARDIS has her own thoughts on the matter. The Doctor does her best to help.
Relationships: Thirteenth Doctor/Clara Oswin Oswald
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21
Collections: Bulletproof 20/21





	When Life Gives You Lemons

**Author's Note:**

  * For [blueberry](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueberry/gifts).



> This plays merry hell with the timeline, but I just _had_ to write them with these prompts. I hope you enjoy the fic!

Clara stood in the TARDIS kitchen, arms crossed, and she tapped her foot. 

It was… weird, to be back here, and she wasn’t entirely sure what to do with herself. She was uncomfortable and ecstatic and she was _here_ , and that was all she could concentrate on presently, really.

And when she was anxious, she baked. 

“Who doesn’t love a souffle,” Clara said, more to deal with the quiet than to say anything. The Doctor was… busy doing whatever it was that she did with the TARDIS, and Clara wasn’t going to look too closely, because the Doctor was always up to _something_ when it came to the TARDIS, and that seemed to be a universal, like gravity and taxes.

And the TARDIS not liking her very much.

This was the kitchen that was the most reliable - when the TARDIS was in a mood, it sometimes filled the fridge with holographic cobras, or strange wriggling grubs (unfortunately not holographic), or containers with biohazard symbols on them, but usually this one at least had eggs, milk, and other such staples. 

Not all of them in combinations that made sense (sugar and potatoes, what a mix), but… well, it was _something_. 

And then she took note of the gentle vibration under the soles of her feet, and the general finicky nature of souffle, even one made with her mother's excellent recipe. Was she in the mood to baby and fuss over a dish? 

Maybe a souffle was out. 

"What d'you have in store for me?" Clara wondered aloud, and she opened the fridge door to find… lemons. 

They were big lemons, bigger than her clenched fist, and they all looked to be at the peak of ripeness. If there was perfection in lemon form, the fruits filling the fridge in front of her exemplified it. 

"I feel like you're trying to send me a message," Clara said dryly. There were eggs, at least, eggs and milk, and the library _was_ right there. She could nip over, get a cookbook, and hopefully the TARDIS wouldn't move this kitchen to someplace she wouldn't be able to find. 

They'd been getting on better, since she'd come back. Maybe the TARDIS had missed her? 

The TARDIS rumbled at her, but the lights didn't dim, and when she left the kitchen, there wasn't the familiar wheezing groan of rooms being rearranged. So that boded well. 

-*-

The library was still where it was supposed to be, and when Clara came back with a cookbook, the kitchen (with its walls the color of tomato soup and deep blue countertops) was still there. The fridge was still stocked with lemons and eggs, and now that Clara had a recipe book, she could take stock.

There was yeast. There was flour, sugar, butter, salt, even cream cheese. She'd never been entirely _comfortable_ with yeast - it wasn't finicky like a soufflé, but her gran had always told her about how yeast had moods and you had to woo it. Clara didn't generally consider herself the type of person who wanted to deal with any kind of foodstuff that needed to be _wooed_. 

But the picture of the lemon rolls looked entirely too enticing for its own good, and Clara had never been good at resisting temptation. 

"How hard can it be?" Clara asked the empty kitchen, and the TARDIS gave a hum that _might_ have been smug, if Clara wasn't making a point of being charitable with her interpretations. 

-*-

"What are you frowning at?" 

Clara jumped, looking over at the Doctor. The newest incarnation of her best friend could be surprisingly quiet when the mood suited, and it still took Clara by surprise sometimes.

"Am I frowning?" Clara looked over her shoulder, and she watched the Doctor tuck a piece of blond hair behind one ear. It was still faintly odd, to barely need to look up at the Doctor. The Doctor kept looking at her with a slightly nervous expression, as if she was expecting to get yelled at or slapped, or maybe for Clara to suggest some kind of wild new adventure.

Admittedly, Clara had done all three of those things when they'd first bumped each other, after the explosions had died down.

"Yeah," said the Doctor, and she came closer, her thumb coming out to smooth out the line that always formed between Clara's eyebrows. "You're clearly thinking about something very hard." 

"Why isn't my yeast blooming?" Clara poked the bowl, and it formed little ripples in the water.

"Wrong kind of bowl," the Doctor said promptly.

Clara blinked. "What?" 

"Wrong kind of bowl," the Doctor repeated. "Yeast likes a warm environment, and if you want to do that properly, it helps to be able to warm the bowl up first. And that's easier to do with a metal bowl."

"Oh," said Clara. "Since when do you know so much about yeast?"

"I know plenty of things," the Doctor said, taking her coat off and draping it over the back of a chair. "Can I help?"

"Is this gonna be you helping me, or you taking over and then losing interest halfway through to go examine the dematerialization circuit or have tea with Marie Antoinette or something?" Clara raised an eyebrow.

"I wouldn't want to have tea with Marie, she never shares the croissants," said the Doctor, and she looked vaguely affronted.

"You know what I mean," Clara said. 

"I won't dash off," the Doctor promised. "So can I help?" She was rolling her sleeves up now. "I've got some experience with baking, y'know."

"I thought you said you weren't a very good cook," Clara said, frowning. 

"I said I can't make a meringue," the Doctor corrected. "They're difficult," she added, and she looked faintly sheepish. "Anyway," she added, "the only person who ever wanted me to make them a meringue was Zora Neale Hurston, and you _know_ how humid it is in Florida."

"... right," said Clara, and even if she was faintly lost, she wasn't going to let the Doctor know that. "But," she added, "no sonic."

The Doctor wrinkled her nose. "What's wrong with using the sonic in the kitchen?" Her tone was plaintive. 

"We had to clean that smoothie mix off of the _ceiling_ ," Clara said, indignant. "To say nothing of how long it took me to get the blueberries out of my hair." 

"Made it more exciting," the Doctor said cheerfully, and then she picked up Clara's bowl of milk and yeast. "So d'you wanna see the trick?"

"Sure," said Clara. "Sure. Let's see the trick." And then she grinned. "After that," she added, "we can make meringues."

"It's gonna come out horrible," the Doctor said cheerfully. "But you don't know until you've tried!" She rubbed her hands together. "Okay. So. First things first..." She went to the cupboard over the fridge, and pulled out a big metal bowl. Then she was at the sink, washing her hands with quick, efficient rubs, the soap like sea foam on the edges of waves. She then stuck the metal bowl under the tap and turned it on at full blast. The drumming of water on the concave surface was faintly soothing, like rain on a tin roof. 

"Oh ye of little faith," Clara said, as the Doctor continued to rummage. "Since when do you know so much about baking?" 

"I know loads of things," the Doctor said earnestly, as she got out the containers of sugar and flour and yeast. "I just don't put 'em into practice much."

"You get rusty if you don't practice," Clara pointed out.

"Very true," the Doctor agreed. "I guess we'll need to do this more often, then." She said it casually, but when Clara shot her a sidelong look, she saw the Doctor's cheeks turning pink.

"I guess so," said Clara. "I'm gonna... warm the milk up."

"Don't make it too hot," the Doctor said quickly, as Clara poured even more milk out into the little bowl and stuck it in the microwave. "Y'don't wanna scald the yeast."

"I won't scald the yeast," Clara said, the microwave beeping as she set it up. 

There was an awkward silence, as the microwave hummed, and the two of them stood in the kitchen. 

"I missed you," the Doctor said then, and it was such a simple statement that still made Clara's throat close up. 

"I missed you too," Clara said, and then the microwave beeped, making the both of them jump. Clara turned around, and she was blushing as she took the warm bowl out.

The water turned off, and the Doctor put the warm bowl on the counter. Clara poured the milk in, and the Doctor spooned in the yeast, then added a pinch of sugar. "Now, we wait," the Doctor said. "It needs some time to bloom."

"I'm surprised _you're_ telling me to wait," Clara teased. "You've never been especially patient, have you?"

"No," the Doctor said, her tone serene. "But yeast is like love."

That was... unexpected. Clara watched the whisk move through the warm milk, the little brown specks dissolving into the milk. "That sounds like something off of a baking themed greeting card," she told the Doctor.

"No, I mean it," the Doctor said, and now she sounded faintly embarrassed, defensive. "Because you need to give it the right environment, you need to nourish it, and sometimes you need to just let it sit." The Doctor's hand went over Clara's, stilling it, and the ripples across the surface of the milk gradually died off, leaving the whole thing still.

The Doctor's shoulder was up against Clara's, and her hands were smaller than they had been. They were still cool, though, and Clara took the whisk out of the milk, dropping it into the sink. 

"Well," she said, turning to face the Doctor, and then the Doctor was bringing Clara's hand up to her mouth, kissing the back of Clara's knuckles. She was smiling, just a bit, and that made Clara's cheeks turn redder. Her knees were going weak, and her mouth was getting dry. "How long does it need to sit?" Clara asked, and her voice cracked. 

"What, love, or the yeast?" 

Clara took some comfort in the fact that the Doctor looked just as lost as she was feeling. "The yeast," Clara said. 

"Oh. Until it looks right," the Doctor said, and Clara snorted.

"That isn't a very good indicator," Clara told the Doctor. "How am I supposed to know when it looks right?" 

"You'll know," the Doctor said, all confidence. 

"That's not helpful," Clara grumbled.

"When it's all... bubbly. Foamy." The Doctor waved her hands around, as if she was trying to demonstrate said bubbliness. "It'll smell right, too," she added. "Alive. And all..." More waved hands.

Clara made a face, and the Doctor made one back, and then Clara couldn't help but grin, because really, how could she _not_? "You're a horrible baking instructor," she told the Doctor.

"I make up for it with my other skills," the Doctor said, unrepentant. "So you're going to show me how to make a meringue?" 

"Right," said Clara, and she rubbed her hands together. "First things first, we're going to need to separate some eggs."

-*-

The Doctor, it turned out, was not very good at separating eggs. Neither was Clara. 

It really was a good thing that the lemon rolls would need eggs, or else they'd have ended up eating scrambled eggs. Not that scrambled eggs were so bad - especially when the Doctor made them, but... well. Clara was in the mood for _sweet_ , not whatever savory creation the Doctor would create. 

In the end, there were egg yolks in a little bowl, and egg whites in the other bowl. "I don't think we have a hand mixer in here," Clara said, "or a stand mixer. Pity."

"I can do it," the Doctor said confidently, watching Clara carefully measure sugar into the bowl. "I've cooked before there even was electricity!"

"Weren't you just saying you have trouble with meringues because you were baking back in the day?" Clara began to whisk the egg whites, her wrist moving in the familiar practiced motion. There was the memory of standing next to her mum, watching the pale liquid turn into opaque foam. It had seemed like magic back then, and even if she knew the science and the technique, it still seemed like magic. 

"It weren't because of the electricity," the Doctor said, "just the fact that meringues always come out _soggy_ when it's humid, and do you get much more humid than Florida?" The Doctor gestured for the bowl, and Clara handed it over. 

"Sounds like an excuse to me," Clara said, and she was mostly teasing. 

The Doctor sniffed, and she whisked. Or at least, she tried to. She was moving the whisk a little too wildly, and Clara frowned. It was her turn to cover a hand moving a whisk, and she guided the Doctor through the short, sharp motions. 

To the Doctor's credit, she went along with it, and she was very warm against Clara's front, her hair ticklish against Clara's cheek. "You're good at that," the Doctor said, her voice quiet. 

Clara paused, and the only sounds in the room were the hum of the TARDIS, and the sounds of the whisk in the egg whites. They were starting to get more opaque, fluffing up as they filled with air, the little bubbles getting more noticeable. "Practice," she said. 

They were having some kind of moment.

"It's the same kind of motion you use for giving a hand job," the Doctor said, her tone earnest. "At least, from what I remember. It's been a while."

And the moment was ruined.

"Doctor," Clara said, and she wasn't sure if she was scandalized or resigned. A little seed of warmth bloomed, and her whole face was getting redder. 

"Of course," the Doctor added, her tone reflective, "I think I've got more experience, but from a different angle."

"Oh my god," Clara groaned, and she pressed her forehead into the Doctor's shoulder. "I can't believe you just said that."

"What?" The Doctor sounded genuinely bewildered. "This isn't the first time I've referenced being a man!"

"You don't usually talk about it in regards to giving hand jobs," Clara said, her tone long suffering. 

"I was thinking more masturbation than hand jobs in that case," the Doctor said. "Does it really count as a hand job, if you're doing it to yourself?"

Clara reached up and put a hand over the Doctor's mouth. The Doctor's breath was ticklish and humid across the back of her hand, and the Doctor's shoulder was still moving as she whisked. "You didn't used to make dirty jokes," she said. 

"Hardly a dirty joke," the Doctor protested, her lips moving against Clara's palm. "More a reference. And not that dirty!"

"Not exactly a clean one," said Clara. "I wasn't sure if you even knew what a hand job _was_."

"Of course I knew what a hand job was," the Doctor said, and now she sounded faintly affronted. "As old as I am, as many as I've given. As many as I've received. As many as I've received from _you_ ," she added, almost as an afterthought, and Clara pressed her hot cheek into the Doctor's cotton covered shoulder. "Sorry," the Doctor said, after a full minute of silence. "Was that the wrong thing to say?"

"It's still weird to think of you as you are now compared to the you as you... were," said Clara. "Since... well. You're so much different." Her eyes were lingering on the Doctor's lips, the elegant line of her jaw. 

"I was different before," the Doctor said, then; "d'you think you could take over for a little bit?"

"I thought you had practice," Clara teased, but she let go of the Doctor, coming around to take the bowl. She began to whisk it with practiced ease, and then she caught the Doctor's expression. She flushed. "Not a word," she said, gesturing with the end of the whisk. 

"Weren't gonna say anything," the Doctor said, and she was grinning. She leaned over the bowl with the yeast in it, and her grin got wide. "Oo, Clara! Come see!"

"What am I looking at?" Clara looked down into the bowl, and she saw foam. The scent of the yeast hit her - bread, beer, the scent of something growing, something bubbling. She knew what the Doctor had meant, now, when she'd said "it'll smell right," because that was exactly what this was. 

"It bloomed," the Doctor said, and her blond hair fell over her face. "It bloomed because it loves you." She was avoiding Clara's eyes, and Clara kept her eyes on the yeast as well, as another little bubble came up. "Because it sees that you're taking care of it, and it wants to take care of you, too." 

Clara bit her lip, looked down into the bowl again, then up into the Doctor's eyes. They were very solemn, staring into her own. "Is there anything special I need to do?" She wasn't sure if she was asking about the recipe, or... what else would she be asking about?

"Keep at the recipe," said the Doctor, and then she paused. "How will I know when to stop stirring the egg whites?" Clara was very carefully _not_ looking at the Doctor's elegant, tapered fingers.

"When they look right," said Clara, just to be an ass, then: "when they've got firm peaks." 

"Right," said the Doctor. "That... might be a while." 

"I'm sure you can do it," Clara said, and now she was smirking. "All that practice, right?"

"That were in my other bodies," the Doctor protested, and then she was grinning, her nose wrinkling up. "Gotta build the muscle tone up a bit." 

Clara stood up on tiptoe, to get the container off of a high cupboard. She could almost feel the Doctor's eyes on her, and when she looked over her shoulder, she caught the Doctor looking her up and down. 

"Might want to get different muscles into shape," Clara said, and her mouth was very dry.

The Doctor didn't say anything, but she was blushing as she nodded.

-*-

By the time the egg whites had formed stiff peaks, the yeast had fully bloomed. There had been a brief, exciting few minutes as she looked for a zester, and then she'd shot down the Doctor's increasingly ridiculous suggestions. Then the zester came clattering out of a cabinet - maybe the TARDIS doing some kind of self defense mode? - and then the Doctor was put to zesting lemons while Clara spread the whipped egg whites onto the parchment paper covered sheet pan.

And realized she'd forgotten to turn the oven on, which led to Clara shooting down any suggestions by the Doctor to speed up the preheating process. 

"I thought you used a piping bag for meringues," said the Doctor, as Clara carefully used a silicone spatula to spread it flat. She was zesting a lemon into the bowl with the yeast and milk. She'd added melted butter as well, and it was a scum across the top, mixing with the yeast bubbles, and the little bits of lemon zest were like snow. 

"Sometimes, but I figure we could do something big with it," said Clara. "Just make a big slab, and then we could crack it up, and... hm." Her eyes fell on the egg yolks, which were still sitting out. Probably unsanitary, come to think of it. "We could do... lemon curd," she said, because that needed both egg yolks and lemons, right? 

"Lemon curd? You know, I've had some absolutely _lovely_ lemon curd with Queen Victoria. She's a fiend for the stuff, I got the recipe off of her cook." The Doctor ran her fingers along the zester, collecting more zest and dumping it into the mess in the bowl. "Although I think that one needs Valencia orange," she added. "I could go and check, if you'd like?"

"No, we can use mine," Clara said, because she wasn't sure if the Doctor was going to find where she'd written down the recipe or running off to find Queen Victoria's cook, and by the time _that_ adventure was over the meringues would probably be burnt. 

"Right," said the Doctor. "Sorry, Clara." She looked sheepish. "I'm good at lemon curd," she added. "It's basically custard, and I am a custard _expert_."

Clara raised an eyebrow. "Are you, now?" She watched the Doctor finish zesting the one lemon, and move on to the next one.

"Most definitely," said the Doctor. "Don't you trust me?"

"When it comes to baking? Not as far as I could throw you," Clara said. She set the meringues in the oven, then set the little tomato shaped timer. "Those will be in there for a while yet, getting nice and dry." 

The Doctor dumped more lemon zest into the bowl, and then she smiled at Clara. "D'you trust me with things other than baking?" Her tone was casual, but her gaze was intense enough to pin Clara, like an insect to a card. 

"I trust you with some things, yes," Clara said, and then she busied herself with measuring the flour into a different bowl, because that was a _tad_ too intense for her just then. 

She heard the sound of the zester being put down, and then there was a hand on her own. It had little bits of lemon peel on it, and she squeezed the fingers, then went back to measuring out the flour.

"I wonder what the old girl was trying to tell us, with all the lemons," the Doctor said, as if they hadn't shared the little moment. Thankfully, because Clara could only take so much feeling at once. 

"She still doesn't like me," Clara grumbled. 

"She does," the Doctor insisted, as she spooned salt into the mixture. The flour was a crumbly mess on top, slowly being absorbed. "She just... shows it in odd ways." 

"Is this the TARDIS equivalent of pulling my pigtails and pushing me into the mud?" Clara got the silicone spatula and began to move it around the bowl, pushing the flour into the center and incorporating it. 

"No, I think that was the business with the leopard," the Doctor said, her tone thoughtful. 

"Wonderful," Clara said, and she was using the spatula to turn the dough into a ball. "Grease the bowl up for me, please," she told the Doctor, and wonder of wonder of wonders, the Doctor did as she was asked, taking the oil and rubbing it along the insides. 

"So this is possibly just her having a craving," the Doctor said, as Clara turned the dough out onto the floured tabletop and began to knead it. "Oh, I should've gotten you an apron," she added, as a poof of flour turned the red fabric of her dress dusty. 

Clara looked down at her own stomach, and she made a face, and folded the dough again, leaning into it. The dough was almost sticky enough to stick to her fingers, although the application of flour was helping. It was silky against the pads of her fingers and her palms, and it rose back up slowly when she pressed on it, slowly losing the impressions of her hands. She folded it over again, pressed it down, and she watched it take into itself. "Can she have cravings?" 

"Y'know, I hadn't ever thought her capable of it, but she's capable of a lot of unexpected things, aren't you, old girl?" The Doctor patted the table, and the TARDIS rumbled. 

"I don't know how I feel about the ship I'm riding being able to _taste_ anything," Clara said, as her hands sank into the dough. She added some more flour to the table and to her hands, and she kept kneading carefully. She'd always found kneading dough restful - when she was in a bad mood she punched it, when she was in a good mood, she just got a good work out for her arms, although now she was thinking about their earlier bantering about building _certain muscles_ and her face was turning pink again. 

"I dunno," the Doctor said. "There's something complimentary about something that can taste keeping you around. About it liking you enough that it wants to _keep_ tasting you." She was holding eye contact, and she was licking her lips. 

_Does she know that she's doing that?_ Clara's analytical mind asked, while the rest of her melted down into the lino. She tried to press her thighs together discreetly, aware that her nipples were probably showing through the fabric of her dress, aware that her mouth was dry and she was beginning to sweat. 

"She's never liked me," Clara said instead, falling back on that old chestnut.

The Doctor chuckled, and there was an obnoxious twinkle in her eye. 

Impulsively, Clara reached out and gripped the Doctor's chin in her hand. It left a smudge of flour, and when she let go, the Doctor looked faintly surprised. 

"Well," the Doctor said, before Clara had a chance to really regret whatever rash thing she'd just done, the Doctor was grabbing a handful of flour and dumping it in Clara's hair. 

"Oi!" Clara moved around the table, and then the Doctor was pressed up against her front, and when had _that_ happened? 

"Well," said the Doctor again, and Clara was still looking up into her eyes. _Always looking up at the Doctor, literally and metaphorically_.

Clara only barely had to rise up on her tiptoes to kiss the Doctor, and that was a nice change. The Doctor's mouth was still cool, still soft against her own. She remembered being shocked at the differences and the similarities between the two. Now there was another, and all she could think was _her hair is on my face now_. It was very soft hair, and the hands that were on her waist were small, delicate. The hips under Clara's hands were rounded, and then Clara's own hands were moving up, the insides of her wrists brushing against the sides of the Doctor's breasts, to bury in that self same hair that was brushing on Clara's face. Her tongue was in the Doctor's mouth, and the Doctor's tongue was against her own, the Doctor's tongue was in her mouth, feeling along her teeth, and then the Doctors' hands were clutching at her dress, no doubt wrinkling it. 

When they pulled apart, the Doctor's face was flushed and her eyes were very dark. "We should probably put the dough to rise," she said. 

Clara pressed another little kiss to the Doctor's swollen lips. "Probably," she said, and she moved in for another kiss. She'd been thinking about this since she'd seen the mad woman in the blue coat, been dreaming of it and dreading it and anticipating it in equal measures. And now it was _here_ , it was happening. 

"And wash our hands," the Doctor added. "Since, uh." She cleared her throat. "Important to be hygienic." 

“I’m surprised you can think of hygiene at a time like this,” Clara said, and her speech sounded awkward and slurred in her own ears. 

“I can assure you,” the Doctor said, untangling herself and making her way to the sink, “my thoughts are _anything_ but hygienic.” 

Clara blushed so hard that she was faintly afraid she’d pass out, and she blamed the desperate arousal coiling in the base of her belly on that. She was usually a little more even keeled than this, but… _oh_ , her knickers were wet and sticky, and her nipples were so hard that the Doctor _had_ to see them. 

Although a surreptitious glance at the Doctor’s front showed that the other woman wasn’t doing much better. Clara washed her hands hurriedly, and then she was back at the table, kneading the dough again, letting the solid, familiar motions of push, fold, roll, push, fold, roll wash over her. The Doctor was behind her now, nuzzling into her neck, and Clara shivered.

 _She still remembers all your sensitive spots_ , Clara thought, and then she lost her train of thought, because the Doctor’s hands were on her breasts. 

The Doctor was holding them as if she was judging their weight, her thumbs slowly passing over the hard tips of Clara’s nipples. Her mouth was on Clara’s ear, and it was _loud_ , but it sent more shivers up Clara’s back, as she planted her feet.

“I’m not going to be able to finish the lemon rolls, if you keep that up,” Clara said. “And the meringues might burn. And I need to get started on the lemon curd.”

“Wouldn’t want the lemon rolls to be half-done,” the Doctor said, her tone all seriousness. She took a step back, and Clara immediately missed the solid warmth of another body against her own, even if it wasn’t as warm as a human body. 

Clara dropped the dough into the bowl, making sure that it was evenly coated. She covered the bowl with a tea towel, and she put it on the stove top. Her hands were still greasy when the Doctor pushed her into the counter, but she clutched at the Doctor’s braces and let her face be turned up to be kissed, panting into the Doctor’s mouth. 

She sighed, as the buttons at the front of her dress were undone. Her bra was pushed up, and the Doctor’s small, cool fingers twisted over her nipples. “They’re just as lovely as I remembered,” the Doctor said against Clara’s lips. “D’you know what I’ve wanted to do, since I saw you in this kitchen in that dress?”

“I would v-v-very much like to… like to know,” Clara gasped. She awkwardly groped the Doctor through the two t-shirts, shoving the braces off of the Doctor’s shoulders. “Please tell me.”

“I’d rather show you, honestly,” said the Doctor, and then she was getting down on her knees in one long motion. 

And then pausing. 

“Ow,” the Doctor said, and she sounded surprised. 

“D’you wanna kneel on something?” Clara leaned over, groping around the countertop until she found something soft. She grabbed an oven mitt and shoved it at the Doctor, who had wrangled herself into some kind of position so that she could fit both knees on it. Then the Doctor’s head was disappearing under Clara’s skirt, and her breath was ticklish across the front of Clara’s knickers. 

_It’s a good thing I put the egg yolks back in the fridge_ , Clara thought, then; _oh wow, her tongue is longer than his was._

The Doctor was lapping at her slit through the thin cotton, and then the crotch of Clara’s knickers was being pushed to the side. The Doctor was lapping at her vulva, and it was the same motions as before, with a new mouth.

Clara was up on her tiptoes, and she fumbled her knickers down awkwardly, kicking them off of one leg. She lifted the hem of her skirt up, so that she could watch the Doctor, and it really was a good thing that she was leaning against the counter, because the sight of the Doctor’s jaw moving, in concert with the sensation of the Doctor’s lips on her labia…

Clara moaned, and she clutched at her own hair, pulling her head back. She ground her hips forward as the Doctor’s lips wrapped around her clit, and she _wailed_ when the Doctor began to suck. She was losing herself in the sensations - the Doctor’s warm (not as warm as a human, but still warm the way all living things are warm) tongue against her clit, her labia, slipping inside of her, trailing along her perineum, then back up to swirl along her clit. She had dropped her skirt at one point, and it was bunched around her belly, as her fingers sank into the Doctor’s hair. She clutched it, so hard that the thin hair was cutting into her fingers, and she rode the Doctor’s face. 

The air smelled sweet, like lemons and sugar, and there was the dusty scent of flour, mixed in with the musk of sex. The lights were pulsing in time with the Doctor’s tongue, and the counter she was leaning against was pulsing too, and this was all so _much_. It was building and building, the orgasm and whatever emotions were building in Clara’s chest, and she didn’t want to look at them too closely, didn’t want to look too closely at anything, she just wanted to _feel_.

She whined when the Doctor’s crooked finger pushed into her, blunt and bony. They were smaller than her previous sets of fingers, more slender. The knuckles were less knobbly, but they still found that one spot inside that made Clara see stars erupt behind her eyes. She cried out as she jerked her hips forward, chasing the pleasure, and then the orgasm seemed to catch up with her out of nowhere, and she was pulsing around the Doctor, her cunt clenching and releasing like a fist. 

The Doctor made a happy, wet noise, and Clara groaned. She saw the Doctor’s shoulder moving, and then the Doctor was gasping against her again, and it was a long, drawn out sound. The finger inside of her was withdrawn, leaving Clara empty and open, and she slid down onto the floor, her chest heaving. She kissed the Doctor, tasting her own cunt and the Doctor’s own flavor, the Doctor’s arm trapped between them.

“Did you really get yourself off while kneeling on an oven mitt?” Clara’s tone was teasing. 

“I couldn’t help it,” the Doctor said, although she sounded sheepish. She took her hand out of her trousers, and Clara caught the wrist, bringing the Doctor’s fingers to her lips. She lapped the wetness off, and then she caught the Doctor’s expression. “Similar,” she said, and she caught the Doctor’s embarrassed expression. “Not quite the same.”

“Um,” said the Doctor, and then the timer _dinged_ , and they both jumped. 

“Let me just… get that,” Clara stood up on unsteady legs, making her way towards the oven. Lacking an oven mitt, she grabbed a tea towel, doubled it up, and took the tray out. 

“How’d it come out?” There was the sound of the Doctor washing her hands, as Clara set the tray onto the empty part of the stovetop.

“Congratulations, Doctor,” Clara said. “You’ve successfully made a meringue.”

“Oh wow,” said the Doctor. She went to poke it with her damp fingers, and she made an indignant noise when Clara slapped the back of her hand away. “Ow! What was that for?” 

“You’re gonna ruin it if you do that,” Clara said. “ _And_ you’ll probably burn yourself!”

The Doctor pouted, and Clara snorted, and kissed her again. Now that they’d done it, how was she supposed to resist? 

The Doctor kissed back, and her damp cheeks were cool against Clara’s overheated ones. She must have washed her face off too, then. 

“So,” the Doctor said, when they broke apart, “we’ve got a giant slab of meringue. What are we gonna do with it now?”

“I was thinking we could do something like an Eton mess," Clara said. "With the lemon curd. Maybe candy some lemon peel to mix in with it, since we're not short of lemons. Or sugar."

"More like an eatin' mess," the Doctor said, and she looked entirely too pleased with herself. 

Clara snorted, and nudged the Doctor in the ribs with her elbow. Whatever tension that had been bubbling between them seemed to have finally abated, leaving the old, familiar intimacy behind. 

Clara leaned into the Doctor, and she sighed as the Doctor's arms wrapped around her waist. She sighed, and her shoulders finally relaxed. “”We’re gonna need to zest more lemons,” she told the Doctor.

“Well,” the Doctor said, “I’m not too worried we’ll run out.”

-*-

When it was all done - the rolls filled, cut, and baked, the curd cooled and sitting in its bowl, the meringue cool enough to break into bits without burning the fingers - they feasted. The meringue was crunchy between the teeth, and it melted sweetly on the tongue. The curd was sharp enough that Clara could feel the bite in the spots where she used to have her wisdom teeth, and it was smooth. The rolls were soft, and the filling was bright and tart.

“We should do some frosting,” Clara said, looking pensively down at the rolls. “Still needs… something. Maybe I’ll see if I can get some orange peel next time, to make the taste pop a bit more.”

“I think you’re going overboard,” the Doctor said. She snagged another piece of meringue, and it crunched between her teeth. Her hair was in disarray, and she looked the kind of disheveled that might have been considered artful if she was wearing different sorts of clothes.

“You’re one to talk,” Clara retorted, and she took another spoonful of lemon curd, letting it linger on her tongue like a nice wine. “I’ve seen how you get with the TARDIS, when you’re in a mood.”

“Well,” the Doctor said, and her knee was pressed against Clara’s. “I can’t argue with that.”

“You could,” Clara said, and she took another piece of meringue. “But hey, I was creative, wasn’t I? I was given lemons, and I went above and beyond.” 

The Doctor snorted, and she kissed Clara again. Her mouth tasted like lemon zest, like sugar, and like home.

**Author's Note:**

> I wasn't entirely accurate with the recipes in this fic, but here are the three I was thinking of while writing it! 
> 
> https://www.butterbeready.com/lemon-sweet-rolls/?fbclid=IwAR1YG1HChy5bwGSzScBHtqDuGsnz8asDE1pXf62wcYy8UpdS97KjyjeMDec
> 
> https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/how-to-make-lemon-curd/
> 
> https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/jamie-oliver/tray-baked-meringue-with-pears-cream-toasted-hazelnuts-and-chocolate-sauce-recipe-1951305


End file.
